A care units with good access to the patient by the care providers are used especially in the field of neonatology, as an alternative or as a complement to incubators which are generally closed with a hood.
A patient care unit with a hood that can be lowered and with an air flow over the bed is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,759,149, in which the point at which the air flow components meet and the site at which they are drawn off are generally separated in space and coincide only when the hood is closed. The switch-over between different operating states is associated with cooling of the patient in this prior-art care unit.